We braaied last night and swam today. Passage finally feels like an Argonaut adventure and not a miserable beat upwind. This morning we broke out the Code 0 and Ben baked fresh bread for egg, bacon and cheese sandwiches. All is well in the world. Except for Alex’s finger which got sliced whilst doing dishes. Jury is out on whether it was an accident or if she’d just had enough of dishes.

What a long passage this has been! And it’s only been a week. Tonight we braai! 🥩

This evening brings the end of our first night of downwind sailing on this passage. The first few days saw us beating and the fourth night we were on high alert as we skirted the Nicaraguan pirates. And so a treat was in order! Last year when we were a few hundred miles up the Amazon we discovered the recipe for Bailey’s wasn’t so complicated and more importantly that we had all the ingredients in the cupboard/bilges/under our beds. The consumption of Bailey’s on board increased rapidly thereafter.

Engine lacked power. Many hours were spent tinkering, number 2 cylinder was declared not firing. Injectors came off. Injectors got new nozzles. From a reputable shop. We hopped to another island. Engine died with a reef either side. We sailed/towed ourselves onto and off of the anchorage inside the reef. We phoned mechanics far and wide who diagnosed the smoke. Everything from timing to swollen pistons was proposed and considered. We advanced the timing a little bit and did an idle speed cheat. And then headed to the only mainland marina that can accommodate us, thinking maybe our engine issues were a thing of the past. Our engine works fine until we throttle back btw, you know like when you come into an area of tight manoeuvres :). And yes dear reader, you have correctly assumed that our optimism was not realism. We motored through the channel got to the basin and as we were scouting out the best mooring finger we throttled back and our engine died, which lead to a beautiful little pirouette and us tying up not to the dock of our choosing but to the dock that we were gliding to. And so, we’ve removed the injectors and the injector pump for good measure and done some serious land based miles in a washing machine of a car doing visa extensions with less than friendly officials and heading inland to a tractor friendly area with an injector specialist. Apparently the new nozzles were wildly wrong, not just a different pattern, a different orientation. So the old injectors have had a good ultrasonic clean and been put back on. Tomorrow sees us refitting the pump & injectors and then it’s off to another reef encircled anchorage to test our handy-work. In other news we picked up a dear old friend who’s flown over from South Africa and is here for a month of sailing, at least she hopes it’s a month of sailing and not a month of passing the number 13,14 and 17 spanners. 🔧

Fixed the engine. Avoided the pirates. Had a braai. How for Bocas :)

Thought of the day. 18/11/2024. When I left Cape Town on my undisclosed, indefinite sailing mission I severely underestimated the extent to which I would become a diesel mechanic. I’ve had to be a plumber a couple of times, an electrician by choice, but a diesel mechanic by necessity. The crew have proposed that I get two tattoos, the first being an artistic combination of the dive hand signals for “boat” and “something wrong.” The second being “it’s always fuel.” Of the previous 4 countries we’ve arrived in, 3 have been under sail or tow. We are back under Argonaughty alongside tow configuration. Ben will be telling many stories to his powerboat level 2 candidates I’m sure.

Can confirm this wreck is indeed in place. Very happy we are in an aluminium hulled boat today.

LOL 😂. Shot round a hurricane. Steering fell off. Engine was full of shit. Etc. Boat tried to sink. Usual day at the office.